


Red in the Ledger

by Telaryn



Category: The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Book/Movie Fusion, Assassination Attempt(s), Clint Barton Made a Different Call, Family, Gen, Hostage Situations, Mission Fic, SHIELD, Snipers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-13
Updated: 2017-03-13
Packaged: 2018-10-04 07:32:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10271492
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Telaryn/pseuds/Telaryn
Summary: It still comes down to the two of them, and the shot Hawkeye chose not to take.  Other hands were on their strings that night, however, and other pawns to be sacrificed unless Natasha agreed to make a different call.





	

**Author's Note:**

> After reading the magnificent novel "Forever Red" by Margaret Stohl, I wanted to make a few changes to that iconic moment in Clint and Natasha's history.

Looking back, Clint could see that he should have questioned Coulson’s insistence that he stay focused on mapping the Black Widow’s movements. Particularly when the decision was handed down to create a kill box; nothing in his week of reading files and tailing her through the streets of Prague supported the idea of them being able to craft a trap and expect her to just walk into it.

“Traps need bait…sir.” Clint knew he was stating the obvious, but the knowledge that Coulson was withholding intel was an itch that he badly needed to scratch.

The second he saw the eyebrow raise, Hawkeye knew he wasn’t going to get anything useful out of his handler. “I need you focused, Agent Barton. You are the only one who can take this shot.” It wasn’t an answer, but he’d worked with Phil Coulson long enough to understand it was the best he was going to get.

They settled on Saturday for the hit. Her movements around the city were starting to show signs of restlessness. Clint knew that whatever Coulson might be planning, they couldn’t risk her taking flight. _We’ll never get another chance like this._

Coulson confirmed his suspicions during their next briefing. “How certain are you she’ll stay through Saturday?”

Clint showed him the flyer he’d retrieved from one of the local storefronts. “Swan Lake. You know she’s got a strong background in dance – she’s been watching the rehearsals all week. Something about the lead dancer has her fascinated.”

“Are we sure the woman isn’t a target?” Coulson looked uncharacteristically nervous.

“She’s not on the job.” Clint didn’t know why he was so certain, but he felt the truth of it in his bones. Natasha Romanoff was searching for something that had nothing to do with her clients or her kill list. The clock was running out on them though; if she didn’t find whatever it was in the next handful of days Clint knew with equal conviction that she would vanish

Something of his certainty seemed to transmit to his handler. “So…Saturday?”

Clint could only nod in agreement.  
Saturday pre-dawn found him walking a rooftop east of the Prague Opera House, checking sight lines, escape routes, everything that could possibly affect him taking the shot. “I want a three block perimeter around this place,” he told the junior agent Coulson had detached to help him with the details. “Put Shelly on that roof over there…” He pointed to the top of an apartment building across the street from their position. “…otherwise, nobody within three blocks of this place. I don’t care how good they think they are – the only way we’re going to guarantee the target doesn’t make them is if they’re not around to be made.”

 _”By that reasoning, Agent Shelly is a liability as well.”_ Coulson’s calm voice over his com was vaguely chiding. Clint didn’t take offense – Coulson wasn’t overruling him after all. _Yet._

“I need somebody backing me up if she decides to run,” Clint said. “You’re convinced you can draw her in – I’m just trying to account for her choosing to rabbit.”

Once again he was left to wonder what bait was so powerful Coulson was willing to trust an operation this sensitive to it. _”Carry on,”_ was all he heard over the com by way of response.

Clint spent another hour making absolutely certain of his calculations before dismissing himself and the junior agent to breakfast. The rest of the day he kept to himself, checking and rechecking his weapons, and napping as he felt like it.

Sunset found him back on the rooftop, beginning the ritual of settling into his nest. Coulson had questioned his decision to go without dinner, but Hawkeye had done enough of these ops that he knew when his body could tolerate food and when it was likely to end up being a really bad idea. Thankfully his handler had watched him through enough of those same missions that he knew better than to argue.

The moon was dark. Clint had enough light to see the cul-du-sac below his position from the lamps at the street and the glow from several of the windows surrounding the space, but there were enough shadows in play that if he missed…

He put that thought aside as he began laying out his archery kit. Light levels mattered about as much as his choice of weapon. This was the Black Widow he was hunting. Good, bad or indifferent, he was only going to get one shot.

 _”I’d feel more comfortable if you were using the rifle.”_ Clint smiled in spite of the mild rebuke in Coulson’s tone. It was one of the only hints he would get that Phil was as nervous about this op as he was.

“Not your call, Boss, remember?” he replied, selecting an arrow and fitting it to the string. “Means and method are my choice. We even had Fury write it into my job description after that clusterfuck in Tangiers.” He’d been sure he was headed for a cell after that mess. It was early in his SHIELD career, before he and Coulson had found an equilibrium with each other.

These days, Coulson questioning his decisions were almost as much of their pre-mission ritual as Clint deciding whether to eat or not. Being able to push back, even a little bit, steadied him in a way few other things could. Coulson was still Coulson. He was still Hawkeye.

Now he could take the shot. Blowing out a quiet breath to center himself, he let go worrying about anything that might take him out of the moment. Getting Natasha Romanoff into the trap wasn’t his concern anymore. His only job was to react once she was there.

The chatter on his coms fell off to a dull murmur; in his head Clint could see Coulson signaling the command center for quiet. Shelly’s breathing was a fraction louder than everything else being transmitted – he knew better than to give his position away by calling out Black Widow’s approach, but Clint listened for the tiny hesitation in his breathing that signaled as clearly as any spoken word that their quarry was in sight.

His hand tightened on his weapon as he watched the entrance to the cul de sac.

She was dressed for battle. Her cat-suit fit her like a second skin; the unrelieved black broken only by flashes of silver from the bracers on each wrist and the buckle on her belt. A Glock 9mm was in each hand, fingers on the triggers even though they were both currently aimed at the cobblestones. Centering himself once more, Clint came to full draw; sighting on her head. She didn’t wear any sort of body armor that he was aware of, but nothing in his orders said that this couldn’t be quick or clean.

He was a hair’s breadth from releasing his arrow when she reached the center of the cul de sac. “I’m here!” she called out in Russian, turning slowly to scan the surrounding buildings. Dropping his aim, Clint only just managed to pull back out of her line of sight. “You can let him go! I won’t fight!” Clint risked a glance and saw that she had raised her hands – both guns now hanging useless in her fingers.

 _”Agent Barton, take the shot.”_ Coulson’s voice was a low growl in his ear. Hawkeye grimaced, half-tempted to take his com out entirely. It was taking him a beat to translate what the Widow was calling out, and he didn’t like what he was hearing one bit.

“Take your shot!” she said just then, echoing Coulson’s order. “I surrender! You can let him go!”

Her back was to him again. Moving into position, Clint came to full draw. _Do it. You have your orders._ She’d killed countless agents, compromised more operations than he would probably ever know, and he had her in his sights. All he had to do was release his arrow and it would be done. _Plus she wants you to. You are literally the only person here having a problem with this!_

 _”Agent Barton…”_ Coulson began, and the sound of his voice was enough to tip the balance.

“Abort,” he said softly, easing back to a ‘ready’ stance. “I don’t have a shot.”

 _“Barton goddammit, you take the shot! That’s an order!”_ The fact that he had rattled Coulson deeply enough to make his handler swear over an open channel perversely strengthened Clint’s resolve. He couldn’t be a party to this. Coulson had held up his end of the deal – whoever SHIELD had gotten their hands on was clearly important enough to bring the Black Widow to this point.

She was looking for an out. It was the only explanation that tied together everything he’d seen of her since coming to Prague. _And SHIELD is giving it to you,_ he thought, tightening up his aim and moving into the light. Whoever they had was drawing her into the only freedom Natasha Romanoff believed was in the cards for somebody like her.

But SHIELD wasn’t just assassinations and intrigue in the darkness. For Clint, SHIELD had been a second chance – the opportunity to start over and chart a new course for himself. It was that SHIELD he embraced as he ignored Coulson screaming in his ear and called out in her native Russian, “Drop your weapons, Natasha Romanoff. On your knees. Hands on your head.”  
**********************************  
The Black Widow felt a swooping sensation in the pit of her stomach as she adjusted to a reality in which she was _not_ dead. The shadow she had felt in her wake since coming to Prague was in front of her now, clearly outlined against the star-lit sky. A compound bow was in his hands at full draw – at this angle she couldn’t tell where it was aimed, but common sense said the shot would be true and fatal.

All she had to do was twitch the wrong way, and this man would end it. _Could_ end it, which was even more fascinating. It was certainly an unexpected place to find herself.

“Drop your weapons!” the archer repeated in badly broken Russian. “Slowly…keep your hands in view.”

Not taking her eyes off her captor, Natasha did as she was told – making a show of ejecting the clips from both Glocks and emptying their chambers before laying the guns on the cobblestones in front of her. Rolling smoothly to her knees, she clasped her hands at the back of her head.

The archer stood motionless for the span of two heartbeats, long enough for Natasha to silently plead with him to shoot, to end it, to bring her long journey to a close at last. Instead of answering her prayer though, he lowered his weapon and _jumped_ \- first from his place on the roof to a nearby second floor balcony, then from that perch to the ground. She blinked and he was at full draw again, cross-stepping until he was in front of her.

“You are my prisoner,” he said, again in Russian. Reaching her guns, he kicked them further out of reach without looking. “If you move before I tell you to, you will be shot without further warning. Do you understand?”

As he spoke, Natasha caught movement at the edge of her vision. He’d brought back-up, which was currently staying at a far enough distance to be moderately useful. She couldn’t tell for certain in the darkness, but that one appeared to be carrying a more traditional rifle. _And you’re ready to die if I try to take you hostage,_ she realized, focusing on the archer again and finally seeing the patch on his left chest. _SHIELD_.

It figured. “I understand,” she said. When she made no further move to speak, her captor lowered his weapon at last. The arrow went back into a quiver on his back, followed by the bow being slung. “I’m going to secure your hands behind your back, he said, stepping forward and to the side. “I will move you where I want you – do not make any moves on your own.”

He read as older than her, by at least a couple of years. Pale hair a fraction longer than strict military regs, musculature more acrobatic than she was used to seeing, although she had to allow that his leap from the roof would be influencing her assessment. She could detect none of the usual tells one would associate with an experienced enough sniper to have been set on her trail, but his hands as he took first one wrist then the other to cuff them behind her back, were trembling faintly. _Not stupid then,_

His expression, as he crouched in front of her, was also devoid of any of the pride or arrogance she would have expected from someone in his current position. He spoke to her again in Russian, and Natasha felt something inside her break. “Please stop,” she said in English, trying not to laugh openly at him when he was working so hard to be decent to her. “Your accent is awful. You need to search me, to make certain I am telling the truth about my weapons. I understand.”

A small, charming smile flashed in his expression, quickly suppressed by what Natasha suspected was his professional demeanor. “Languages were never my thing,” he muttered in English this time. Gripping her upper arm firmly, he added, “I’m going to get you back on your feet.”

Nodding to show that she understood, Natasha didn’t fight him as he pulled her back to her feet. His hands were quick and professional as he searched her, finding each of her hidden knives, the garrote in her belt and the poison capsules in her wrist bracers. Each discovery heightened her awareness of her circumstances – what she was doing and who she was surrendering to.

“Has my brother been harmed?”

Her captor froze, looking up at her from his crouched position. “What did you say?”

She hadn’t intended to ask, fearing the answer, but there was something about the archer that she connected with. And then when his confusion abruptly turned to anger, Natasha worried that she had made a potentially fatal mistake. “He is just a boy,” she added, hoping to reach the innate decency she had sensed in the man. “He knows nothing of my work.”

Pushing to his feet, her captor backed away from her a couple of steps – raising a hand to show her that he still meant her no harm. “Coulson?” he asked, his other hand going to the com-piece in his left ear. “What the hell did you do?”  
***************************************  
He really was going to end up in a cell this time _or worse_ , but Clint was rapidly running out of reasons to care. Coulson’s terse suggestion that he get hold of himself only penetrated his growing rage because he still had custody of the human equivalent of a dirty bomb, and if the Black Widow suddenly decided family ties were no longer important to her he and Agent Shelly were well and truly screwed.

“Just tell me you didn’t know,” he said, as Shelly joined them. His partner’s eyes were wide, but his expression was inscrutable.

“I knew Coulson was keeping something from you,” he said finally, “but I swear I didn’t know they had the Widow’s brother in custody.” He glanced at their captive. “I didn’t even know she had a brother.”

“I doubt many people did,” Clint muttered. Taking Natasha’s upper arm again, he motioned for Shelly to take point.

“Don’t get any ideas,” he said as they made their way through the network of alleys taking them back to the op headquarters. “My orders are still to kill you. Run and I will carry them out.” It was a roll of the dice whether she believed him or not, but Clint didn’t bother glancing back to verify she was still in a cooperative mood.

They heard the boy’s sobs as they entered the warehouse. _Fear, not pain,_ Clint’s brain helpfully supplied, otherwise he really would have done something he couldn’t come back from. An audience had gathered to meet them, an enraged Coulson at the front of the crowd, arms crossed over his chest. _So be it,_ Clint thought, meeting his handler’s gaze without flinching. “We opening a daycare, boss?” He glanced pointedly at the slender figure surrounded by his fellow agents. The kid was fourteen or fifteen, struggling to control himself now that he could see his sister. He was blonder than the Widow’s dark red tresses, but without the mark of full manhood on him yet his facial features told Clint all he needed to know about the familial connection in play.

“Day care?” Coulson repeated,, drawing Clint’s full attention now. “I thought it was a shelter for wayward assassins.” His gaze ticked to the Black Widow, then back again. “You care to explain this?”

 _You first,_ Clint thought, but that was something he definitely didn’t dare say out loud – not in front of all these witnesses. “You let me think you had the kind of bait that would draw her into a kill box. You didn’t tell me she would walk into that courtyard and surrender – what was I supposed to do?”

He knew Coulson’s next look. He saw it a lot; it was his handler’s “I know you’re not that fucking stupid” look. “And now because you’ve suddenly gone _soft_ , a simple hit is now something very messy and _very_ political.”

“Or potentially one of the greatest acquisitions SHIELD has ever made!” Clint’s hind brain was screaming at him now, to take a breath, step back, show throat, but he’d surprised Coulson with his exclamation, and that awareness made him reckless. “Think about it Boss,” he continued, softening his tone and trying to ignore all the eyes on them. “She wants out – I told you that three days ago. We all thought the only way to do that would be to put her down, but what if she comes over to SHIELD?” He sensed Natasha tense behind him, but Clint didn’t dare turn and see if there was any visible reaction to what he was proposing.

Silence fell over the room, broken only by the boy’s continued tears. “Let him go,” Clint said calmly. “Coulson, come on. We’ve got her – we don’t need him.”

His handler was struggling with the potential opportunities Clint was offering, balanced against the fact that they would be going farther off script than he suspected Coulson had ever been in his life – and sacrificing one of the biggest wins of either of their careers in the process. “You’re awfully quiet,” Coulson said at last – his attention ticking from Clint to Natasha. “Do you understand what he’s saying? Do you have any thoughts about it?”  
****************************************  
Natasha had already decided her circumstances couldn’t get any stranger when Coulson put the question to her. “You would consider what he is proposing?” She understood that it was virtually the same question he was asking her, but since she had already worked out that ‘Hawkeye’ didn’t have the authority to bring about what he was proposing and Alexei was still very much in the picture, she wanted to be very sure of this man before she committed to anything.

“What will you do if I say no?” Coulson asked, his expression giving her nothing to work with.

Deciding that it was an acceptable risk to push back a little, Natasha made a point of surveying the assembled throng. “Do everything in my power to see Alexei safely out of here,” she said, her attention returning to Coulson. She felt Barton tense, but Coulson silenced any argument he was preparing to make with a look. “Only one of you is any kind of match for me,” she went on, “but while he could kill me, I sincerely doubt he has what it takes to subdue me.” 

Her estimation of Barton rose a notch when he didn’t react outwardly to her evaluation of his ability. “If he kills me though, you get nothing.” The sound of Alexei struggling to control his tears cut deeper than any knife wound Natasha had ever received, but she made herself stone. Only one person in this room mattered right now. She couldn’t afford to be distracted by emotional concerns.

Agent Coulson presented himself as an ordinary handler – more bureaucrat than warrior – but there was an intelligence in his light blue eyes Natasha knew she could work with. He understood the people he surrounded himself with; he hadn’t been surprised when Agent Barton had reacted angrily to finding out Alexei was being used against her, but he also hadn’t gone immediately to torturing the boy to get whatever it was he wanted.

“I have people I answer to,” he said finally. “The mission wasn’t to bring you in.” His attention ticked to Barton, still at her right shoulder. “Take her to holding.”

Natasha was surprised again, when instead of obeying immediately Barton asked, “What about the kid?”

Coulson’s eyes narrowed slightly, and she saw the muscles along his jawline tighten. “The _kid_ will be fed and given a chance to calm down. Anything beyond that is not open for discussion at this time.” The air between the two men fairly crackled with what _wasn’t_ being said, but Natasha forced herself not to react. Alexei would be safe for now. She could trust Phil Coulson that far.

“C’mon.” The colloquialism was followed by a light touch on her shoulder. When she looked up to acknowledge Agent Barton, he indicated the direction they needed to go with a small jerk of his head.

She went without protest. So long as Alexei’s freedom was still on the table, there was no reason not to cooperate. Agent Barton paced her without comment – the one time Natasha dared risk a glance at him, she saw a man wrestling with much darker thoughts than she suspected he was used to having.

‘Holding’ proved to be exactly what she thought it was – a steel barred cage in the middle of a room with no windows and only one door guarded by a very bored looking SHIELD agent. Directing her into the room with a soft push, Agent Barton paused to speak to the man. “No one comes out of that room without Agent Coulson’s say-so.” The agent nodded, but Barton wasn’t finished making his point. “If I’m bleeding to death on the other side of that door, Agent Coulson better be standing in front of you when he gives you the okay to unlock, understand?”

Natasha barely covered a smile of her own at the agent’s now wide-eyed and slightly terrified nod.

Satisfied now that he’d made his point, Barton stepped over the threshold; immediately crowding her back several paces. “Turn around,” he told her as the door was secured behind him. Natasha did immediately as he directed. “I have to put you in the cage, but there’s no reason you have to keep these on.” She felt a tug at her wrists, then the cuffs securing her fell away.

Easing her arms around to the front, she began massaging feeling back into her wrists. “May I ask you a question?” She kept her voice as neutral as possible. Barton was ostensibly on her side insofar as that was possible – she didn’t want to risk that by being caught out trying to manipulate him.

He moved into her field of view. “Can’t promise I’ll answer, but sure.”

“Why does it bother you that they are using my brother to control me?” Not only was she curious, the answer Barton gave and the way he gave it would tell her much about the man himself.

He was silent for a long moment, but Natasha didn’t sense any internal struggle over whether or not he should answer her. _More like he’s choosing his words. He wants to be certain there is no misunderstanding between us._ “The kid’s an innocent,” he said at last. “Everything you’ve done, it’s obviously important to you that he stays that way.”

More silence – Natasha sensed a mounting frustration in him. “Now, no matter what happens he gets to live knowing that we used him to get to you. It’s not...” He shook his head. “I know what I am. I didn’t sign up to make war on children.”

She honestly didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.  
*********************************************  
“Why did you spare me?”

It was the question Clint had been expecting her to ask, which was why he’d fumbled answering her about her brother and Coulson’s decisions. “You had your orders,” she added, catching his gaze and holding it. “They kept knowledge of my brother from you.”

He nodded, suddenly very aware of how close they were standing to each other. “I wanted to show you there was another way,” he told her, grateful that his voice wasn’t shaking. “That you didn’t have to die to escape. I know that’s what they tell you in the Red Room.” He used the Russian name for it without thinking, but Natasha was apparently too focused on what he was saying to give him any grief about it. “They tell you death is the only escape. SHIELD isn’t like that.”

“This will make trouble for you.” 

Clint couldn’t tell whether she intended it as a question or a statement, but either way it did startle a small laugh out of him. “Won’t be the first time.” Sobering, he gestured at the cage. “I am sorry, but…”

He doubted anyone but him would have seen the small shiver that slid across her skin. “You’re not leaving, are you?”

“Not until Agent Coulson lets me out, remember?” That seemed to satisfy her. Once she was on the other side of the bars, Clint secured the door. He waited patiently while she paced the perimeter of the enclosure, analyzing every inch of its construction; searching for weaknesses he desperately hoped she wouldn’t be able to find.

“If Coulson decides to bring you over, they’re going to still want information.” Clint could tell by the wicked side-eye she shot him that he wasn’t telling her anything she hadn’t already figured out, but the longer he spent with Natasha Romanoff, the more weirdly protective he felt about her. _Protective about someone who could probably kill me even now._

Okay, so the irony of the situation wasn’t totally lost on him.

“If I give my loyalty to SHIELD, they may have what I know,” the Widow said, returning to stand across the bars from him. “My only concern is my brother.”

“Your brother is going to be okay,” Clint insisted, hoping deep down he wasn’t promising her any more than Coulson was willing to deliver. “Especially once they see that you’re willing to cooperate – there’s no reason to keep him in custody.”

He suspected she was pitying him for being impossibly naïve or stupid, but there wasn’t anything he could put his finger on to back it up. Coulson had seized on Alexei as a target of opportunity, nothing more. If the Black Widow was indeed willing to give SHIELD all her secrets, there would be no reason…

The sound of the door opening cut off his mental ramblings before they could become desperate. He and Natasha turned almost in unison to face Coulson standing at the door. He looked from one to the other, then signaled for Clint to join him in the hallway.

“I half expected you to have forgotten to put her _behind_ the bars,” Coulson snarked. Hawkeye started to bristle, but forced himself not to rise to the bait. If he was really going to do this, he needed to convince the man standing across from him that while his decision might have been raw impulse, what they were proposing now was a solid plan and ultimately to SHIELD’s benefit.

Dropping into a parade rest stance, he met his handler’s gaze without flinching. “What part of this bothers you the most, sir? The fact that I made a different call, or that you didn’t even consider this might be an option?”

He wasn’t expected Coulson’s expression to shift into one of genuine concern. “The fact that you’ve put your career on the line by making a public show of support for this idea. Right or wrong, Clint – and I’m not prepared to say you’re wrong yet – you’ve just tied yourself to the Black Widow for the foreseeable future. Assuming I can convince Fury to sign on, HQ isn’t going to want to risk putting any other agents close to her. Not until we can be sure.”

Clint shrugged. “I don’t mind. As for being sure – she’s already said that if her brother goes free, she’ll give us everything she has.”

“Generous,” Coulson snorted. “You do know her memory gets wiped in between missions, right? It’s why she’s so good at what she does.”

It wasn’t the _only_ reason, but Clint wasn’t about to have that conversation with his handler. _Not now, at any rate._ Coulson’s reveal of the memory wipe, though, that had sparked an idea. “The memory wipe – is that technology we have?” He suspected it wasn’t, at least not at the level Natasha knew it, otherwise he would have been subjected to it.

Twigging to the fact that he was going somewhere by asking the question, Coulson fell silent and gestured for him to keep talking. “I was just thinking that if we knew how to do it, it might be a way to guarantee her brother’s safety _and_ keep him from being an ongoing liability.” A vulnerability they could exploit wasn’t something they wanted to leave out there for others to take advantage of. Not once she became SHIELD.

Coulson seemed to be thinking along the same lines. “We would have to take her memory of him as well as his memory of her,” he said, smiling slightly, “But if she's willing - that, I can sell.”


End file.
